]]>Fri, 27 Apr 2018 04:00:00 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/accidental-beats-planningRather surprised to pick up a flyer at the library and find an artist for my proposed Civil War graphic novel. How unlikely is that!

We'll see where is goes, because pitching comes first when artists need to be paid! Glad to have had not just a graphic novel seminar experience but a whole lunch with expert Callista Brill at Buckeystown MD SCBWI a few years ago.

It's even nicer to have a podcast from Callista giving the real facts. of what she dreads reading, which is even more important than what she wants.

Just think of my efforts to entice agent Marie Lamba with my horse book. Getting to know her better, I found out that she hated horses!

]]>Wed, 18 Apr 2018 14:28:40 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/on-writing-seminarsEditors' comments resemble instructions from a boss. The suggestions are meaningful to them, but maybe not to you. I took a chapter book for critique several years ago and was told to "heighten the stakes, put in more tension and anxiety." I could hardly believe it -- for eight year olds? I enquired just how I should accomplish that in a kids book. Parental discord was suggested, dumbfounding this amateur. Eventually I figured out how to spread fear and loathing among three children and two adults.When my editor for 1777, Val Muller, asked for more emotion, my scene involved one child and one unconscious adult. I could only express the child's anxiety to leave the scene, because that would have been my own 12 year old reaction!When I went to Writers' Project Runway two weeks ago, I wasn't sure what take-aways I would find.​What I learned counted as the full answer to the question above. The lessons on layering emotion let me feel that I'd hit the jackpot!Bravo Pennwriters for bringing Annette Dashofy and Hillary Hauck to us for a day andthanks to Bobbi Carducci, for everything!]]>Wed, 21 Mar 2018 18:35:59 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/two-trowbridges-adrift-in-the-civil-warMy last addition to Spot Writers told of a Trowbridge victim of the LaFourche Crossing battle in the Civil War. The attending surgeon was another Trowbridge, originally from Danbury, but practicing medicine in Stamford CT at the time of enlistment in the 23rd Ct. Volunteers.If they did not know each other before, this could not have been the most pleasant meeting. Dr. William Trowbridge was left the only doctor on the field to care for almost two hundred wounded Confederates. How did it happen that the Union troops went off and left him with the opposing forces for six weeks? At that time their period of enlistment was up and they came back to fetch him and such Union wounded as had been taken. The Confederates appear content to have him to continue practicing as their doctor.​Stay tuned!]]>Fri, 16 Mar 2018 23:55:01 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/sundry-on-fridayToday's Spot Writers offering is my favorite of the ones Val has given us.I thought up this topic and now have to do my best by Dr. William Trowbridge, the results to appear in about two weeks.

I had stopped fast fiction and gone back to slow fiction and 1777. Driven by guilt, I have been getting up at 3 AM to refine it even more. I'm following after my editor's suggestions of last summer (before the big move to Hamilton.)

​Soon I will be furloughed from work and plan to visit Clark Hamilton's last battle, at Cedar Creek in Winchester, VA. I have never really done anything more than look at it while turning into my friend Darrell's driveway. A little more research needed here!]]>Sun, 04 Mar 2018 02:49:27 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/their-very-last-chance I spend so much time on my recent flash fiction addiction because the Hamilton family characters in my book have lived with me for five years and will live with me for the rest of my life. Minor characters only see the glow from the flash fiction - there and gone, just as they were. I have always felt a guilt that those people were as deserving as any family member and yet heard, "No full-length novel for you!"My last FF piece was about a Trowbridge who lived against all odds. This week's offering on the next page is about a Hamilton whose life was taken from him. We would never know how it happened if someone hadn't told his parents an ugly truth. Hurtful? Not to his father, for how could the truth hurt more than the deceptive phrases we dream up to glorify war?]]>Sun, 25 Feb 2018 13:09:49 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/unintended-consequencesFlash Fiction is supposed to encourage us to write fast and well. Still spending too much time on it! Look forward to my next post, again considering the Hamilton family of Danbury CT. A few years ago, I found a half dozen letters written on school lined paper (Remember Indian tablets?), Yes, that paper - and it looked brand new.​When I read one letter there in the Connecticut State library, I wanted to cry.Look forward to another Hamilton resident as he is memorialized by his father in my next Spot Writers flash fiction.

]]>Wed, 31 Jan 2018 01:20:17 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/just-one-war-after-anotherWhen you live in the past, as I do, many of the interesting events happened in war. My new Spot Writers Page will feature short glimpses of my family history, but a different family and a different war.

1777 involved my Hamilton family, who seem to have wised up by the Civil War and remained as far away as they could get.

The Trowbridges went in for that event whole hog.In 1777, the only Trowbridge mentioned (John) is away at war while his tavern forms a mancave for rebels. Many Trowbridges to come would live in Danbury and were always ready to support their colony or state, or whatever skirmish came along ...

All you have to do is know a little bit of what happened .... Then you do a little research.... Then welcome to 1863!]]>Tue, 30 Jan 2018 00:38:40 GMThttp://www.danburyonfire.com/the-occasional-blog/january-29th-2018What Happened? Where Did I go?

I went to Montana. I meant to return and then we would move somewhere that was not Virginia (unless it was Richmond, which seemed like a good idea). I desired a move to somewhere "not the fastest-growing prices, uh, county in the world."Yeah.Then a mega bicycle accident to my partner. All of a sudden we were not moving, not buying the house we were living in and not living in my own house because I had rented it to a Fauquier County teacher.Hmm.Then the all-consuming search began. At the same time, my equestrian help business dragged me along by the hair (especially until I made the rule of only two different barns per day). We had only looked at one place, a town house the size of my best purse. The thing about townhouses is the HOA - better-known as "the gift that keeps on taking." (In LoudounWorld there are other fees, similar to the famous "fee fee" of commercial fame.) Only the HOA fee shows in the real estate ad. Those other monthly fees show up later.Then I found the rehab townhouse in the rabbit warren.Now how on earth could a person who wrote a book about the Hamilton family NOT move to Hamilton VA?